The conversation might go something like this:
I think the main reason why we often like to spend many hours writing our own programs with LB are as follows.
Firstly it is of course it provides a sense of achievement, to be able to eventually produce a program that is exactly what we want, or someone else wants, rather than make do with some other software that no matter how expensive, still is not quite what we need. Anyone can install software from say a self booting CD or by downloading from the Internet, and then often spend many hours trying to fathom out how to persuade it to do what we want. The help file often turns out to be written by a person with very poor sense of the art of teaching. How many times have you come across a button icon, or a reference to something, with no explanation anywhere in the index of its full purpose?
The trouble is that much of the popular software has to be designed to be ' All Things for Everyone ', with the result it is often not quite what anyone really wants, mainly because in trying to please everyone, it has become too complicated for most. The beauty of writing your own, is that you can eliminate all the unnecessary frills and options you or your friends will never need, thus producing something that is far easier to understand, and a lot quicker to use.
I give a classic example. The Treasurer of our local Radio and Electronics Club, wanted a program to keep track of lots being sold at our Junk Sales. He is a passionate believer in the Spreadsheet, and both he and others tried unsuccessfully to adapt one or a popular Database for the purpose, without success. However after some 10 attempts, mostly because he had difficulty in deciding what he really wanted, I eventfully produced a Quickbasic DB to his satisfaction. He has now been using this for a variety of Junk and antique Radios auctions for some 5 years. Unfortunately however he shows little interest in the updated LB version, because he cannot be bothered to use a mouse with his laptop during the actions. The programs are all freely available from my web site. He also struggles to maintain details of the membership, and print labels for the magazines with his beloved Spreadsheet, and I hope one day to persuade him to do this far easier with a LB DB. The complications of using another example by someone else, using a well known DB, has frightened the daylights out of him!
Long before I suspect anyone ever seriously thought to Windows, Visual Basic or even ' C ' there were numerous little computers for the home, most of which relied on some version or other of BASIC. As a result a great many programs were written for these early PCs. The great advantage of LB is that it also is based on BASIC and QBASIC. As a result it is often a fairly simple process to update many of the ancient programs using LB, but not such a very easy proposition I would imagine using ' C ' or VB!
Finally of course there is always a chance you may be able to produce something unique enough to market for some financial reward. But before you get to enthusiastic, I suggest you search the Internet Shareware Distributors to see how many people have already thought of your idea, to decide if it will allow you to really claim your program will be something quite different. Personally I never try to market any of my efforts, just satisfying myself they are eventfully exactly what I want, and freely available from my site, which a few other sites very kindly publicise.
In the early days I did persuade a few distributors to accept some of my Quickbasic programs as Freeware, albeit accompanied with a few perfectly justified criticisms! But since nearly all the distributors now find it necessary to make a charge for the service, and each LB package is some 20 times larger than the earlier EXE versions, I have given up further attempts.
Gordon Sweet gordon@gsweet.fsnet.co.uk